


next step is out the door

by purmeka



Category: All For the Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Physical/Child Abuse, Pre-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-29
Updated: 2016-10-22
Packaged: 2018-08-11 21:26:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 18,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7908184
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purmeka/pseuds/purmeka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>this was mostly to warm up my writing for an idea i wanna explore.. so yeah, violence/child abuse is probably gonna crop up frequently so turn back if that's not your jam.</p>
        </blockquote>





	1. epilogue

 

His mother stares stone faced at the man with the gun poised at Allen and he grins haughtily when only then does she relax her grip from the gun in her jacket and placidly fold her hands on her lap.

“See, that wasn't hard now was it?”

The driver in the front laughs and cuts off the radio, his passenger turns halfway around in their seat to get a better look at them and Allen tries to keep himself from constantly glancing at his mother. When she noticed him looking at him the first time she only stared back at him in scorn, silently saying: 'Sit still and don't do anything stupid.'

Allen mindlessly reaches up to scratch at his neck and the man beside him turns to look but that was a mistake: That's when his mother grabs the man's wrist and swiftly points the gun away from her, and just in time as it goes off when the man squeezes the trigger by surprise. Allen's ears ring and he isn't sure what to do, the woman in front of him had a grip in his shirt but he knows he has to escape. He bites without restraint into the hand that tastes like gunpowder and grinds his incisors to try and cut into the woman's skin. He's immediately shoved off.

The man sitting beside of Allen slumps and it's only then that he realizes the wetness that was beginning to soak the seats was his blood. He looks frantically for his mother and watches wide eyed at her brandishing a bloodied knife and reaching over the front seat for the driver.

“Allen get out of the car,” his mother yells at him.

He doesn't have time to think. He grabs for his bag from between his legs and soon after he's throwing himself out of the moving vehicle.

He thinks he rolls but the searing pain and burning that blooms across his chest makes him think he's being dragged and rubbed against the hot asphalt like an eraser across a mistake on paper except his own flesh was the only thing being removed. He tumbles endlessly and he distantly hears a loud crash, the car most likely slamming into the metal barrier and off the bridge. He feels winded when he's finally stopped rolling, his chest was heaving and blood was drenching his ruined shirt. He avoids looking down at his chest, the pain was overwhelming and confirming his wound's severity would only make him feel even more faint. He checks his hands instead as he sits himself up. The skin was torn with pieces of asphalt stuck between the flesh prickling with blood. His body felt bruised and it hurt so much to breathe. He looks up for his mother and she was standing a few yards away from him, staring wide eyed at his torso.

She quickly looks away from him to look around for something-- her bag, before she comes to him and drags him up by the arm.

“Move, we need to move. Here, put this on,” she takes off her jacket and shoves it into his bloody hands. When he's too slow to shrug it on she hisses at him to quit being a child. He clenches his teeth as he pulls the jacket on in a quick movement and the pain rips into him. As his vision spots with white his mother zips the jacket up for him to cover his raw chest and soon tugs him to follow her.

He hopes the blood isn't dripping down his front as he runs after her. He hopes he doesn't pass out before they make it to a hotel.

 

⁂

 

It was at some cheap diner that Allen first realizes the emptiness he constantly felt might have been loneliness as he stared vacantly at an ecstatic group of people who were talking animatedly in the booth across from them.

He knows his mother noticed his staring but she says nothing. He pushes the food around his plate and his mind drifts to a dangerous place of wondering what his father was doing. Did the men who so vigilantly hunted after him have friends, did they talk to their families? Did they even care about that sort of thing? He wasn't sure if he did anymore but he accounted that to the fact that he couldn't afford to care about anything beyond running and surviving.

His thoughts suddenly stall to a stop and blank to nothing as he eats his salty fries and greasy burger. 

 

⁂

 

... 

“Allen. Allen, look at me,” his mother grounds out. She was angry.

When he turns to face her she hits him across the face with a heavy smack. He doesn't find himself surprised. He keeps his head down as his face stings and throbs angrily. He gnaws into the soft insides of his cheeks to try and distract himself from the pain, to keep his expression from faltering.

“Allen I said look at me,” she commands again.

He tentatively looks up, bracing for her to smack him again but when she doesn't he finds the look she has on her face more frightening than the pain of being hit itself.

“What did I tell you?”

He moves his jaw, trying to settle on his words before he speaks, “You said not to get close to them.”

“And what else did I say?”

He knew what was going to happen, he knew what this was. He doesn't want to be here but he deserves this, he betrayed her word, potentially endangered the both of them so he deserved the coming punishment.

“You said I can't talk to them.”

She grabs his face and shakes his head as she speaks, “And what did you do anyways?”

He keeps most of his focus on his breathing, trying not to panic as he answers her, “I talked to them.”

She hits him, “And I told you not to.”

She hits him again, “What did I tell you?” and again, “I told you not-” and again, “to talk-” and again, “to them-” and--

Allen was curled up on the ground by this point, his arms curled protectively over his head and he breathes heavily, his ribs thumping with echoing waves of pain. She grabs his hair and forces him to get up on his knees.

“Do I make myself clear?”

He nods.

She shakes him, “Answer me. Say you won't do it again.”

He nods again, “I won't, I promise.”

She lets go and he drops heavily onto the ground and he tries to muffle his coughing. He forces himself to sit up and his face remains passive as he watches him mother walk out of the room with a phone gripped in her hand.

He waits a moment to let the pain settle into his bones before he stands himself up and goes to the bathroom to clean up.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was mostly to warm up my writing for an idea i wanna explore.. so yeah, violence/child abuse is probably gonna crop up frequently so turn back if that's not your jam.


	2. one

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i kind of sort of wrote this fast? lol. so if anything doesn't make sense or needs clarification ask away~
> 
> also, sorry for the switch but i think i'm going to focus on writing about the boy named stefan instead :-) maybe if i feel inspired enough i'll go back and write a separate fic for allen since his part takes place sometime when they're in the states. plus i also imagine that's where they had most of their identity changes (just a gut feeling). anyways, we'll see.

Backpacking and hugging the shoulder of back roads was a deadly business. Doing it in the middle of winter in Germany with no guaranteed place to crash after a day of traveling was suicidal. But Anna was determined, they had been on the run for a three and a half years and they were getting better at putting up with the miserable life on the road.

And because they were in Germany, because they were close to Mary's origins, she was on the edge more often. She took greater precautions to stay out of sight, to not get too close to areas which she knew her family's enemies had claim over. But she never told Stefan any of this, she made it clear to him that it was never safe to talk about. And only after the scathing remarks she made of how he was too young to understand, how all he had to do was listen to her and do as she told he smartly shut up about it.

Instead, they spent most of their conversations improving Stefan's German. Transitioning from speaking nothing but French for half a year meant an accent bled into his words and they couldn't afford to stand out when they were acting as homeless German siblings. Stefan couldn't fathom how his accent mattered since his mother did all the talking whenever they interacted with anyone. His mother would laugh off his quiet as his being shy, that he wasn't any good around strangers. Those words were half true for once.

At one leg of road they trekked, the houses were spaced out for miles. It was miserable trying to forage for food or resources but the scant amount of people made it an appealing place to find refuge at. So Anna backtracks the both of them to stock up on a safe amount of food and supplies before they head back out, hopeful for a place to hide out at. They were lucky when they eventually find an abandoned farmhouse, even luckier when they found it had an overrun and abandoned but plentiful garden despite the season. Stefan was never fond of vegetables but he couldn't complain when half their meals became dependent on their findings. His mother never lets him complain.

Half a week camping out in the house Anna became restless. She was repeatedly tugging and checking the roots of Stefan's blonde hair, "The dye isn't holding, when was the last time we dyed it? I told you to do it last week before we left."

Stefan avoided looking in mirrors so he took his mother's word for it. "There's some leftover dye in my bag, we can do it tonight."

Anna looked over at his bag lying beside a drawer in the room before looking out the window for the nth time. Every night after dinner and before they began practicing Stefan's German, they'd spend some time keeping watch from the second-floor bedroom. It had the best view of the road coming from both ways.

The area the house was located in was rare of the passing cars though. Only a few passed by every night and they quickly came to recognize the trucks that belonged to the other houses miles away from them.

Anna tenses and flaps a hand at Stefan to get down.

He silently does so and watches his mother's face as she keeps her stare outside the window, her eyes tracking a car that was coming down the road. They both seem to hold their breaths as it nears closer and the car's headlights blindingly light the room for a startling second before it passes on. Stefan can't shake off the urge to run but Anna keeps a hand up at Stefan to stay still as she keeps an eye trained outside. She finally moves the curtain back over the window and leaves the bedroom. Stefan grabs his bag as he follows after her.

"Are we leaving?"

"No. We should be safe for a while, they can't have tracked us here so quickly. It'll be easier once we get closer to England."

Stefan wonders if that's because her family was there and thus Nathan's reach of power weaker or because she grew up there and knew the area better. He doesn't ask. He doesn't try to think about it, or about where they'll go after that, about how long they'll have to run. He keeps most of his thoughts trained on the present and what he needs to do in order to survive. His mother managed future plans for the both of them well enough, he thought.

They head downstairs and his mother sits down at the abandoned dining table in the kitchen at the back of the house. She silently watches as Stefan sets his bag down in a chair across from her. Stefan keeps walking across the room and stands at a window that faces the vast and overrun backyard. The only way inside the house was through the backyard door. The front door was the most immediate way inside so barricading it and blocking the ground floor windows was obvious and felt the safest. But it was risky given how they would be trapped inside if their pursuers came in through the back. But there was no way to get to the backyard without walking the whole length of the house after having to bypass the overgrown greenery that surrounded the building.

When Stefan turns around his mother is lighting a cigarette, orange embers glowing as she takes a drag. He breathes in slowly when the smoke reaches him and goes to sit down so that they can begin practicing his German.

They end up staying in the house for another week and Stefan quickly finds himself sick of the potatoes, spinach, cauliflowers and the various other hardy vegetables they were able to gather. They had some dried meats, sausages and multiple loaves of bread that they split among themselves as well as canned soups and packed meals but Stefan could never figure for the life of him how his mother was able to snack of spinach without any dressing, how she was sated to eat potatoes they'd bake in dried leaves every evening. His mother knew of his distaste for vegetables and only gave him an unsympathetic look whenever they ate.

Neither of them were much for talking and as the years passed, as Stefan came to know more and more how deadly things truly were he found the silence and uncertainties of the truth for their runaway more comforting than having to face the truth itself. Maybe that was just his method of survival but the initial shock and realization that his father truly wanted him and his mother dead staunched any initial curiosity he had. Instead, he latched any desire for information to remain focused on the last two boys he had known.

He had to do it in secret though. His mother ripped the newspaper out of his hands when she saw him pouring over the sports section before gripping his jaw, nails digging into his cheek, as she told him to forget about the past, to forget about Exy. It was a useless attachment that he couldn't afford to have.

Stefan didn't understand how an interest in a supposedly pointless sport could be detrimental to their survival but he silently nodded at her. He knew that nothing would tear Exy out of his grip. He knew he'd sooner die if it were completely taken from him when nothing in his life felt real aside from the constant threat of death that saturated each of their every step. It was the one constant in his life and he held onto whatever development he could learn of dearly. So he took every bit of information he could in secret. He'd pilfer magazines and newspapers when his mother wasn't looking and tear out pages in the bathroom and shove them into his bag to look at later.

It was strange, watching Kevin and Riko age through media outlets an ocean away from each other. He'd take solace in knowing that, if not Nathaniel, then at least those two were safe. At least they didn't have to live in the constant fear of getting killed in their sleep. It was pathetic but he lived vicariously through whatever he learned, of each of their achievements on court and how they seemed to only gain higher and higher in the hierarchy of Exy.

He wondered if he could ever play again but the realist part of him knew that his mom would never let him. She would either beat him half to death or be dead herself before he could ever play Exy again and neither outcome sounded appealing.

One night, Stefan is out in the backyard exploring the area behind the house. Straying from his mother's sight drove his heartbeat to an anxious rhythm but it was suffocating to be around one another constantly and Stefan wanted his space. His mother was currently keeping watch of the front so his frantic mind justified that it should be safe, if there was trouble she would come in this direction anyways.

Stefan pauses amidst the overgrown brush and listens as a cold wind passes over him. He quickly ducks down when he suddenly smells the distinct scent of cigarettes.

His immediate thought was that it was his mother but she was anal of making simple slip-ups and made only to smoke indoors. She even carried her cigarette butts with her until she could throw them away in a public trash or burn them down to nothing herself.

Stefan can't see far in the waning daylight and every direction he faces he's met with nothing but overgrown grass. He shivers slightly when he thinks of how he doesn't have his duffel or gun on him. All he has is a spare knife tucked in a sheath on his calf.

He hears a shuffle of steps behind him and he smoothly pulls out his knife without thinking as he moves away. He doesn't know how many there are, if they got to his mother already, if they're armed with guns or knives or both. He holds his breath when a large woman passes him. She was plainly dressed with a large backpack and beside her was another woman with a similar pack that was smoking a cigarette.

They were both looking at the house before the smaller woman turns around and spots Stefan with a flinch, "Fuck!" She laughs. "Fuck, you scared the shit out of me, kid."

Her companion whips her head around with a fierce glare but when she spots Stefan she slightly relaxes. Despite being armed he was half her size, possibly a third of her age and she could easily overpower him. Stefan doesn't let down his guard though, his father's men were deadly but strangers on the road could be just as a deadly inconvenience as his mother has said many times.

"You live here?" The smaller one puffs around her cigarette.

He shakes his head as he fully gets out of his crouch in the grass. He looks around for any more people but the wind masks any sounds beyond the constant shifting trees and grass.

"Don't worry, it's just us. Haven't seen anyone else for miles."

Stefan wonders if he should talk to these strangers and how he could get them to leave. His mother would kill him if he spoke too much or let them think they could stay with them. They'd probably have to leave now that someone's stumbled upon them. The smaller one closely watches Stefan and he can't help but squirm under her stare.

When he finally speaks, he wonders if his German sounded as clumsy as it felt as it passes from his lips. "It's just me and my sister. We were thinking of leaving soon."

The smaller one smiles. "Lucky us, been looking for a place to squat at for a while. City's too damn crowded, hard to get a place without constantly bumping shoulders."

Stefan didn't like making small talk but it never hurt to try to get information. "Did you come from there? It's a long walk."

"Tell me about it, been sleeping out in the fields for the past few days. Lucky we even got our hands on camping gear."

That explained their large packs. He looks to the house hoping his mother was still keeping watch of the front. If she spotted him with strangers she would no doubt bull her way outside to him and intervene.

He shifts from one foot to another and rubs the back of his neck, "Could you maybe stay away for tonight?" When the pair only looks at him he plays a tired sigh as he flicks his knife around in a mindless manner, which the smaller woman keenly kept her eyes on.

"My.. My sister isn't really friendly, especially to strangers. If she was the one you stumbled across I'm not sure you'd have only gotten just a scare earlier." He finally tucks his knife out of sight but within easy reach just in case.

"You telling us to fuck off, squirt?" The large woman asks.

Stefan frowns and flicks his stare to the house, "When you put it like that, yeah."

The smaller one laughs with a hand over her mouth. "There there, he's only looking out for us." She takes a last drag from her cigarette and stubs it out on the ground. "Given how much of an antsy mess he is I think we should take his word for it, I can just imagine how sociable his big sis must be. 'Nother night in the cold won't kill you, love."

"Another night of you bitching about the cold might just make me kill you."

She rolls her eyes with a grin, "And here I keep telling you that a little body warmth would shut me up."

The large woman scowls, "We'll be leaving."

The smaller woman titters and flaps a wave good-bye at Stefan in English, "Ta-ta, little boy."

Stefan watches them leave from where they came and wonders if the English was coincidental. He walks over to where they were standing and pockets the cigarette butt from the ground before he silently retraces their steps. He was curious as to how they were able to bypass his mother's sights and get into the backyard so easily. Usually he'd report back to his mother right away but he didn't feel any immediate danger, though his mind itched with the urge to turn back and run. He was starting to feel the phantom pain of his mother beating the learned response to fear and distrust every person he meets echo in his mind.

After walking slowly and out of sight for a while, he finally catches up to the pair. Their voices we low and he could see the cherry of another one of the smaller woman's cigarette glowing and bouncing between the shifting cover of grass. He could only make a few words out from where he was but the few that he could drove his heart into overdrive and he nearly jumps when the larger woman suddenly laughs out loudly.

The smaller one flips her companion off as they continue walking away.

Stefan stays motionless and watches them, suddenly feeling helpless. It was a stupid idea, he suddenly realized, because even if these women were their enemy Stefan wouldn't be able to handle them and his mother would only be angered at his rash actions. It was getting steadily darker and the cloud coverage would make the night ever more difficult to see in with the moon hidden away. He toys with the knife in his sleeve and finally straightens up as he heads back to the house. If his mother hadn't noticed already she was probably beginning to wonder where he was.

Halfway back to the house he runs into his mother looking wild with concern and anger, though he knew that concern wasn't a kindly one. She grabs his arm and shakes him roughly, "What the hell were you doing so far away?"

Stefan forces his arms to stay limp in her grip and tries to find his words against the creeping panic like that of a child that had done something they knew they shouldn't have. "There were some women. I was tailing them," he mumbles.

"You were what?" She looks behind him as if she could see them from where they were standing, her grip getting steadily tighter. "You talked to them didn't you?"

When he nods he anticipates her hit with his jaws clenched and he slightly moves with it to take some force off of it. He digs his feet into the ground to keep himself from stumbling over and is only distantly aware of her harsh voice as she reprimands him and tugs his hair to look up at her but he keeps his stare between her eyes. When she finally lets go of him to straighten up he avoids looking her straight in the eye and apologizes before she shakes her head, either in angered disgust or disappointment, he doesn't know, and takes his arm.

As she drags him with her back towards the house he quietly recounts the conversation he had with them but keeps the fragmented conversation he overheard to himself. If it made him panic with worry it'd drive his mother to leave in that instant and he wanted to believe that they weren't a threat, stubborn as it was.

Inside the house she nearly shoves him into a chair before leaving out of sight. She was still irritated he acted out of reason and did something he knew she would dislike. When she comes back she hands Stefan his gun, "You haven't cleaned it since we got here. Do it now."

Stefan stares numbly as his mother takes out her own gun from her bag and cleans it over old newspaper she had spread on the dining table. She flicks him a hard look before he's able to gain the feeling in his fingers and automatically goes through the motions of cleaning his gun.

She decides for them to leave in the morning. They'll walk the last stretch of road to town and stay there tomorrow, then leave for the closest city as soon as they can.

After Stefan finishes cleaning his gun his mother takes it from him to give it a last look over and dry fires it a couple of times to feel if it's functioning properly. She gives a nod and sets it back in his hand, "Reload it then go upstairs and check you have all your things together. I'll do a last check downstairs."

After he does as he's told Stefan grabs his duffel on his way upstairs. He checks through his belongings in a dark bedroom on their makeshift bed in the corner of the room. He had a week's worth of clothing, a steadily growing folder of Exy related articles, a small med kit, an assortment of toiletries as well as a plastic container for his colour contacts along with it's cleaning solution. He had some bottles of hair dye stuffed in a ziploc bag as well as a box of sanitary gloves, for dyeing and for when he had to be stitched back together. His mother kept most of her family contact information and money in her own bag but in case they get separated she had given him a slip of paper which can't be read without knowing the key to decrypt it, along with some money that amounted to a couple thousand dollars.

He has everything packed and set away by the time his mother comes upstairs. He stands at the doorway and he watches as she systematically checks every room before she firmly closes their doors. When she looks at him he nods back at her before she enters their room and lets him close the door behind her.

"Where's your gun," she asks as she sits on their bed on the floor to retie her boots.

"Under the pillow."

She lifts up a pillow and lets it fall when she confirms the gun is there. She reaches for his duffel and sets it on his side of the bed before she looks up at him, "Come, let's sleep."

Stefan leaves his shoes on as he crawls into bed, the gun a familiar discomfort under his pillow. He keeps his duffel within arms reach and lets his mother place an arm over him. The winter nights were cold and the scratchy blankets they holed under felt useless but the press of his mother created a small pocket of warmth against his back. He feels her breath slowly even out and soon she's fallen asleep. It takes longer to fall asleep himself, he's unable to stop thinking of the women he met and he can't help but wonder if they were outside camping nearby. His thoughts chase each other in mundane circles but he manages to keep his anxiety at a bay by recalling German verbs and their conjugations in his head or counting up as high as he can before he finally drifts off to sleep.

⁂

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for reading! hmu on tumblr, i draw fanart sometimes n_n)/


	3. two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh my god, i'm really sorry for the wait. writing is not my scene at all, i'm struggling a lot more with this that i thought i would lol. it's.. emotionally draining to say the least;;; but also i'm really iffy w/ my characterizations since this is a younger neil and i'm throwing so much conjecture/personal hc about mary so i'm just.. arRGH!! .. anyways, read with care this chapter gets a bit violent.

If there was anything Stefan despised more than small talk with strangers, it was small talk with overtly enthusiastic strangers on public transportation. People had the habit of asking where you were going, where you were from, and if they were upfront enough, they'd loudly ask what Stefan was doing out of school at this time of day. For the most part, Stefan would have kept quiet and let his mother talk, but she was still upset at him for talking to the pair of women the other day. When a young couple began talking to them Stefan stayed quiet. He expected his mother to talk for the both of them, but she only gave a false smile towards Stefan as if to say, 'You want to talk to strangers so badly? Well, here you are.'

He quickly tires of making face to strangers and as they soon as they get off a train to transfer to another he softly says in resigned French, "I've learned my lesson."

The rest of their journey goes with nothing of note occurring but the longer stretches of time going by without being met with hostile people seemed to only drive Stefan further with worry. He struggled to keep his leg from bouncing with aimless anxiety and his mother would either tell him to quit it or suddenly smack his leg to be still. He desperately wanted to run but the only plausible place to do that was up and down the aisles, and that was guaranteed to gather attention to himself.

When his mother comes back from the bathroom she drops some magazines and a blank notepad with a pen onto Stefan's lap. He looks dumbly from it back to his mother before she answers his questioning look.

"Read. Or draw. I don't care, just quit it with your leg."

Stefan picks up a magazine at random and flicks through it, hopeful for anything pertaining to Exy. His interest is quickly dampened when he realizes it's a food magazine that highlights hot spots for tourists to visit. He looks through another and it's a gossip magazine with celeb photo shoots and snapshots of suspected couples taken by paparazzi. Stefan's mind race when he wonders if people have ever taken photos of him and his mother, but his mind stamps out that thought as quickly as it came. He keeps flipping through the pages and pauses on a double spread interview of a famous actress who mentions Exy but only in passing.

Aside from that none of the magazines contain anything related to Exy and Stefan can't help but feel disappointed. When he tosses the last magazine onto a pile on his bag his mother nudges him, "Don't make a mess." He dutifully stacks the magazines into a neat pile as she continues on, "I'm going to nap. Be quiet, stay put, and keep watch for us."

Stefan nods as his mother then cozies up in her seat, resting her head against their bags that were pressed against his shoulder, and quickly dozes off to sleep. It was only starting to get dark but they had been traveling for the better part of the day. Stefan keeps his mind from wandering too much and keeps track of those who get up, especially of those that go by him and his mother. The only one who looks at him is a bespectacled man who gives a friendly smile from Anna's sleeping figure to Stefan as he passes by.

Stefan hated the aisle seat but at least he didn't feel entirely trapped.

Aside from the people watching fueled by paranoia, Stefan spends the better part of his time making up theoretical lives of the other passengers and doodling mindlessly on the notepad his mother gave him until she wakes up.

He knows she's awake by the sharp intake of breath she takes and the way she tenses before her eyes open. Stefan found it jarring how his mother always woke up bright eyed and alert. As his mother sits up and looks at her wrist watch Stefan closes up the notepad and tucks it and the pen away in his bag.

Anna motions for him to get up, "Switch seats, you can sleep for the rest of the way. I need coffee."

Stefan keeps awake until his mother comes back before he feels safe enough to try to sleep. He hooks an arm through a strap of his bag as he settles against it. It was quiet aside from the loud rumbling of the hulk of the train as it thundered along but he was accustomed to it after hours of sitting in the train. The strong smell of the coffee his mother was drinking pillowed the edges of his consciousness as he drifts off quicker than he expected to.

When he wakes up the first thing he can perceive is his mother's voice, the second being a hand roughly shaking his shoulder. He tenses and instantly recoils, shoulder rolling out of the hand as he then blindly reaches for inside of his bag.

A hand stops him from reaching his gun and a voice cuts in sharply, "Stefan. Wake up."

He blinks a few times and remembers where he was and who the woman in front of him was. His thoughts felt jumbled as if someone shook them around and they were only now beginning to settle back into mismatched place, but he doesn't miss the subtle tension in his mother's face.

"Are we there?"

She shakes her head, "Almost, we're changing seats.”

“Now," she bites out when he takes too long to gather his things. He looks out the window before they leave their seats and notices that the sky was noticeably lighter than when he fell asleep.

As he follows his mother further back the train he keeps his eyes trained on the back of her head. If he doesn't look too long at anyone he won't be that memorable, even less so when he avoids eye contact. He squeezes out to the side of the aisle to let a pair of people pass by the both of them and he notices how his mother's gaze seems to settle on them momentarily before continuing on. He doesn't have the chance to look back behind him to get a second glance as his mother is walking quickly down the aisle.

Anna finally stops at an empty pair of seats at the same spot in the train car as their last seats: at the back and by the door to the next adjoining car.

When Stefan sits down he stifles a yawn as he takes a cup of coffee from his mother. He searches her face as she watches down the aisle and she speaks lowly in French, "I think some of them are on the train."

He feared as much. He swallows his coffee slowly, "Do you know how many?"

She glances back at him before looking back down the aisle again, "No. They'll probably notice we've moved if they were watching us closely."

"Shouldn't we have stayed put then? Us disappearing from our seats only confirms their suspicions."

She scowls, "I know that. I traded spots with a pair. I'm not sure of the woman but the boy looks alike you."

Stefan finally connects the dots to the people they passed but he doesn't feel any more reassured. He hopes it's enough to throw off their pursuers until their train arrives it's destination. She notices his anxiety though and acknowledges it for once by trying to reassure him by quietly explaining her thinking.

"Listen to me Stefan. If they have found us and if they are watching us then it was best for us to move. They can't know where we're sitting now and it'll make it easier for us to slip out of their sights when we get off. And we'll be closer to the station exit so they'll have a small time frame to look for us, even smaller since we'll be moving quickly." He nods slowly, wondering how far ahead his mother thought.

"And if they have people staking out back here?"

His mother doesn't hesitate to look him square in the eye, "Then I'll handle it."

And he knows she would. She would tell him to keep running and take care of them herself without batting an eye. His stomach churns at the thought and he distracts himself by digging for food out of his mother's bag.

At the train station, Stefan bothers to look at signs of which train station they've arrived at and double takes at what he sees. Other passengers have noticed as well and their murmurs of complaints and confusion filled the cabin, some even stomping out of their seats in search of staff to express their frustrations to. He looks at his mother with a look of confusion but her expression was unreadable.

“Why are we stopping so south?” Stefan asks.

He can't believe his eyes when, instead of answering, his mother takes out her gun, and pulls Stefan along with her out of their seats. Glass shatters with the unbelievable sound of gunshots in the train car ahead of them, and there's immediate screaming and confused shouts from the other passengers. Anna grimaces, “Cocky bastards, doing this so publicly. They're desperate.”

Stefan stumbles behind his mother, taking out his gun and releasing it's safety. It was only for last resort, Stefan knew, he would focus more on running and securing an escape route, with his mother at his back covering for the both of them.

His mother quickly leads them out of the car and jumps off onto the empty tracks opposite to the platform the armed men were shooting from. Stefan ignores the other passengers, it was expected that they would all take cover on the floor, but his eyes catch on a young woman covering another with her body. She had a fierce stare at Stefan and he nearly balks but his mother barks at him to move.

He doesn't need to be told twice but his mother yells at him to get onto the other side. He makes a running a start for the empty platform and pulls himself up with his mother pushing him up from behind. He quickly reaches down to pull his up mother with him. He's distantly aware of the high pitched ringing of an oncoming train's whistle but focuses solely on his mother. Panicking would only kill the both of them. She weighed more than him, and understandably so because heavy muscles toned and filled her short frame, so he struggles to pull her up. When his mother manages to hook a hand onto the platform she does most of the work herself as she manages to bring herself over with leverage.

Sudden screaming and gunshots coming from the train car they escaped from cuts off as the train blows past and Stefan can tell that it's not going to decelerate and let passengers off at this stop. They don't have a second to lose, they both scramble onto their feet and run off to exit the station.

⁂

The morning rush of traffic and groggy crowds commuting to work made for a decent cover to throw Nathan's men off their tail but when Anna starts lagging and bringing down their pace to like they're on a casual morning stroll Stefan starts to get jumpy. She drags him with her to the bathroom to change their clothes, from their dull blue and gray shirts to plain white tees and a black jacket thrown on. She even tucks a generic black cap on his head to hide his blonde hair and she ties her own up into a low ponytail. It wasn't much but a wardrobe change could help make them less identifiable.

As they get to the more tourist filled part of the city Anna keeps a hand gripped on his arm to keep him from wandering off, to direct him out of the way of oncoming people. After getting more concerned looks from strangers directed at him than he was comfortable with, Stefan decides to keep his stare down at his feet.

They drift from store to store, lingering in aisles and among crowds to try and blend in. Stefan isn't sure how winning their cover is to others since their duffel bags had to throw off any impression of being tourists but people didn't give them much attention. After lunch they stumble across an old library tucked in a hidden pocket of street from the main road so they hide out in it until it closes. Anna didn't let Stefan look at any of the books, not that he wanted to. He could speak and understand German fine enough, but seeing the words laid down on paper overwhelmed him and he couldn't read long before he completely lost focus.

They don't buy dinner that night. They sit on a bench at a park, sharing stale bread with pale slices of cheese and sausage. Anna makes small talk so the air isn't strange around them and Stefan is thankful for it and the cigarette smoke coming from his mother for once. It feels like the first time in the day that he's fully able to catch his breath. After they finish eating Anna continues walking the both of them through the city, she seems to have a place in mind but Stefan isn't sure where. It was steadily getting dark and they needed a place to sleep for the night.

At a lone stretch of the street there's a pair of men on the other end of the block smoking, just outside the light of a lamppost. They look their way with only a sparing glance but Stefan can hear alarms going off in his head.

When his mother suddenly runs toward them they immediately scatter and Stefan chases after her before he can think against it. All he knows is that he doesn't want to be separated from her. When he catches up to them one man was already down on the ground in a slowly growing pool of blood clutching his gushing gut. He was practically dead and his face was sheet white in the dark alleyway when he looked up at Stefan. His mother was overpowering the other and Stefan knows she could handle him. He pulls out a knife anyways and edges closer, just in case.

“Stay back,” his mother urges, she was kneeling on the other man and beginning to bind his hands behind his back.

Stefan watches numbly and stays put, but when the bleeding man makes a sudden movement, an arm moving out of sight, Stefan is instantly connecting a sloppy punch to his nose with a crunch and pressing the knife against his throat. He keeps his eye trained on the young man's face, at the sweat prickling along his forehead and the blood that was dribbling freely from his nose. Underneath the thick haze of blood Stefan could make out the spicy scent of the cigarettes the men had been smoking. He wasn't making any further attempts to move.

“Stefan,” his mother calls.

He doesn't take his eyes off the man, not trusting him not to try and throw off his light body or to reach for the knife as soon as Stefan's focus is elsewhere.

“Go ahead,” she says.

Such a simple command. His breath stills for a moment. His hand that he punched with was numb. He all at once loses focus from the man's strangely reverent expression and the knife almost neatly slides itself into the throat. He looks away from the body after he pulls his knife out, blood spraying onto the black concrete from the severed jugular. He doesn't watch the blood as it gradually slows to leaking out in measured pulses. He looks for his mother who has a bounded and bloodied man in her grip. She motions for Stefan to come to her.

He looks back down at his hand and notices his grip on the knife was overexerted and drove tremors through it unevenly. Blood was growing cold on his hands and sticky on the hilt. He looks back up. It feels like his body is moving slowly and he focuses on his mother's face only. He can't look at anything else before it all catches up to him and he knows his mother will reprimand him if he lets it affect him.

Everything suddenly settles back in place when she speaks, “Get the door Stefan.”

The complete disregard of his mental well-being made him feel ashamed, as if his emotions were being irrational since his mother doesn't even comment on it. That's supposed to be a good thing, he thought. She didn't notice or she doesn't care enough to call him out on it. He goes to forcibly opens the locked door to the abandoned building and watches as his mother drags the man inside with her. He checks back down the alleyway and drags the body behind a dumpster so it wasn't easily spotted.

When he enters the building and firmly shuts the door behind him the hallway was nearly pitch black. As he walks along the wall and nears closer and closer to the sounds of his mother's voice and pained shouting, it felt as though that was all that existed in his world at that moment. He stops at a door with pale moonlight shining from under it and stands with his back to it and waits. He can hear his mother speaking through the door, loud thuds from what Stefan knows is his mother beating information out of the man. He tries to focus on keeping watch rather than on the steadily dying shouts and sobbing coming from the room behind him.

When things get quiet he knocks on the door and his mother calls for him to come in. He's instantly struck with the sharp smell of blood, spoiled waste, and the rawness of flesh. He distantly catalogs the limp figure crumpled against the wall, the pool of blood, and several dismembered body parts scattered on the ground. He doesn't try to further inspect the other wounds, the smell was enough to tell him it was unsightly. He looks up at his mother and she was uncharacteristically clean of blood, save for the traces of it on her hands and arms.

He waits for her to say something but she stays silent for so long that Stefan almost asks her what's wrong. She suddenly starts moving, her face completely devoid of emotion as she comes towards Stefan. She only jerks her head at him to move. They leave without a second look back. 

His mother tells him nothing but she makes enough phone calls and leaves their hotel room alone often enough that Stefan knows she's reaching out to contacts and planning something. He doesn't ask her anything about it, he knows she'll give him an impassive stare or if her mood is foul enough she'll snap at him to be quiet.

While his mother is away he spends most of his time alone in their hotel room curled up in bed flipping the channels between reruns of movies or on the news. He doesn't actively pay attention to any of it, he mostly has it on for background noise so the overwhelming quiet won't drive him to do something rash. He can't keep his body from tensing whenever he hears doors opening in the hallway, from pressing himself closer against the wall whenever he hears someone walking past their room.

He probably preferred camping out in the cold to hotel rooms. Every instance of running across people then was a justifiably feared thing since danger was expected. In seemingly normal and public places it was difficult for him to pick out the shadier people from a crowd, and it was stifling to say the least. His mind automatically assumed the worst from every person and he hated the feeling of being trapped. He understandably preferred solitude in that respect, since keeping a distance from people meant there wasn't a chance for them to try and breach his trust, except the thought itself was laughable since he wasn't sure if he has ever trusted anyone in his life, aside from the bond he had with his mother.

He wasn't sure how genuine their trust was since, because it was one that was mandatory for their survival, he had no say in letting his mother in. She had never tried to ever be emotionally open with him though, and it was probably for the better, especially with what they were dealing with. Being emotionally susceptible was the last thing his mother would ever be and he didn't expect anything else from her. The cold partnership that grew between them was enough, having attachments only made things more difficult.

He wonders if his mother has lived all her life with such measured emotional distance from everything. It was a complete mystery to him how his parents worked out, but perhaps they never gave anything away to each other. To Nathaniel's eyes they got along only just enough. Mary knew how far she could go before she could break Nathan's temperament from cold tolerance to complete rage, and she used that to her advantage. She could predict when Nathan's moods would get foul enough to lead to physical altercations well enough that she would disappear for the night before things got ugly. She would take Nathaniel out with her for a late night movie and smoothie run, and a trusted bodyguard at lurking at their side since Mary wasn't foolish enough to think she would be any more safe outside of the house.

Stefan turns the television off since the noises and vibrant images were beginning to irritate him. He stares motionlessly into the now black screen with washed out shadows of the furniture and himself in the room reflecting off of it. He rolls onto his side and buries himself under the soft comforter. He struggled with his sense of identity, or lack thereof, and couldn't say anymore what or who he was. The only real, concrete thing of him was his appearance and he couldn't even stomach looking at that. The stark resemblance to his father left nothing but residual feelings of antipathy and fear in him, and he could only imagine what the resemblance made his mother think.

After cat napping for twenty minutes he sits up in bed debating what to do to further kill his time when he hears a series of knocks at the door before it clicks open. His mother carries a paper bag of take-out and sets it at a table before shutting herself in the bathroom. Stefan stays still before he turns the television back on but keeps the sound low. He eats his food in near silence, the food his mother got must have been take-out from a more expensive restaurant since the food was rich and tasty compared to their usual eats.

“Did you eat already?” He asks his mother when she comes out of the bathroom.

She nods once, she was kneeling down on the floor digging through her bag. She sits back up on her haunches as she reloads her gun then slips it back onto it's holster on her back.

“After you're done we're taking a walk.”

He doesn't like the sound of it but it was better than staying alone in the hotel room. He doesn't take the time to savor his food and soon they're out the door, the now empty room reflecting off of the black TV screen.

⁂

It was just after six, the sky was a slate gray and slightly overcast. Stefan puffs out a cold breath, mimicking his mother smoking a cigarette across from him and she only watches him as he does so, a derisive smile ghosting on her lips. Per usual, she's told him nothing of what they were doing sitting at a cafe. Waiting, but for what exactly was beyond Stefan's idea. If he had to guess he'd say they were waiting for a contact, or maybe his mother just wanted to spend time out of their room. The latter made no sense since being out in the open was like painting a huge target on their backs, especially since run-ins with their assailants were becoming common ever since they reached the city.

After they pay for their drinks Stefan's mother leads the both of them through the near-barren streets. She hushes in a quiet voice about various facts of some buildings she can recall. It seems out of character to Stefan but when she starts to drill into him to remember these details in relation to being safe places to hide at in case they get separated, it starts to make sense.

His mind starts to drift off when their conversation lulls to a silence but he's just as quickly brought back when he feels an arm wrap around his shoulders and pull him close. He tries not to tense when he smells the cigarette smoke and remembers that it's his mother. He slowly faces his head down, tucking his chin to his chest and lets his mother lead the both of them, a four-legged single-minded being. Was someone looking at them for too long, had the pursuers been tailing them? He hadn't been paying attention, she was going to hit him for that later.

"Stefan. Look at me."

Stefan turns his head up too quickly, he feels something pull in his neck from the sudden strain but he keeps his face blank when he sees the stony look in her face. She knew he hadn't been paying attention but she wouldn't waste her breath getting angry at him now, not when danger was nearby. She was capable of putting off her anger and Stefan knew from experience that she would be unforgivable when that anger would finally be able to show.

"When I tell you to run, go back to the hotel. Get our bags, your gun, and wait at the fountain," she whispers into his ear.

Stefan doesn't speak, he keeps himself from looking around and only nods. She was already looking ahead, they were walking faster now. He thought he could hear a matching pair of steps behind them and tries not to panic.

"If I'm not there by seven do what I told you before. Understand?"

Stefan nods again. He feels his mouth dry at the fear of being on his own but knows that his mother was better at fending their pursuers off without having to simultaneously defend for him, especially when he was only armed with a knife, an overlooking mistake on his part.

"Then go." She suddenly stops walking and lets him step ahead of her. He sees her turn around and pull out her gun in the corner of his eye as he begins to run. The scent of cigarette quickly washes away as he sprints down the length of the block before ducking into a narrow alleyway, the popping of gunshots going off from behind him.

He hops the fence at the dead end of the alleyway and skirts the edges of buildings as he back tracks a roundabout but memorized route to the hotel. He keeps out of view as much as he can and hopes that there weren't any more men who were keeping watch aside from those that Anna were handling. He stops a block away from the hotel and looks around briefly for any suspicious vehicles or people before jogging inside.

Half an hour later it's fifteen 'til seven and Stefan is at a town square fountain where cobblestones paved from the streets onto the sidewalk. He keeps his head down with his and his mother's bags hanging from his shoulders as he waits for her, trying to keep his mind from teetering off the edge to just run by counting up then down and up again.

He freezes when the phone in his pocket vibrates. When he fishes it out he's not surprised to recognize the number on the screen being his mother's phone but he can't stop the feeling that something is horribly wrong.

He answers the phone, "Where are you?"

He immediately notices the labored breathing. "The other hotel, room 203. Be quick.”

Stefan forces himself not to run. He doesn't stare too long at the various patrol cars that coast up and down the street. He keeps his stare pointed ahead of him and resists the urge to pull up his hoodie, knowing it would only make him less inconspicuous.

He confidently strides into the hotel, avoiding a glance at the front desk since fear made him worry that they'd question him if they didn't recognize him as one of their guests. He fiddles with his phone, trying to act aloof as he waits for the elevator. It'd be suspicious if he went straight for the stairs with all the baggage he has.

When he makes it to the room he knocks a series of knocks his mother decided on as their code. They had it so they wouldn't have to fear a stranger or potential killer at the other side of the door when they'd get split up and have to reunite like this. It was more of a reassurance Mary instilled for Nathaniel's sake but he wasn't sure if that was completely true given how it was mostly him that had to go back and meet up with his mother, but the insurance of knowing that his mother wouldn't answer the door by pulling a gun on him was reassuring at least.

When the door opens he tenses from how his mother looks, her skin was pallid and sweaty. She was clearly injured.

"Get inside," she hisses before fiercely gripping his arm and dragging him into the room.

She rips her bag from his shoulder and digs for her first aid kit and their bottle of whiskey and takes them with her as she quickly goes to the bathroom. Stefan follows her and leans against the threshold.

"How bad is it?" he asks, right as his mother sheds off her shirt and he spots a makeshift but bled through bandage on her back. 

"My arms have cuts. I'm more worried of the ones on my back."

"You need stitches," he doesn't really ask.

"Thank god I stocked up on supplies." She heaves a tired sigh, "Come here and help me."

Stefan does and he feels completely detached from his body as he goes through the automatic motions of cleaning and stitching his mother's wounds. He tries not to focus on the sticky feeling of his mother's blood drying on his gloves or the smell of blood that brought up nothing but awful reminders. When he's finished with her arms she takes a long gulp from the bottle of whiskey before capping it and putting it aside. She takes a deep breath as she leans forward and tries to still her body, “You have the gauze ready?” When he holds it out to show her she nods, “Go ahead. I think the bleeding has mostly slowed by now.”

He carefully removes the bandage and checks the wound that slowly leaks blood. There were two long deep cuts along with several smaller nicks that all needed stitching. The dried blood was black against the bare red of showing tissue. He sets the red bandage aside and works as quickly as he can, his mother groaning lowly when he cleans her wounds, and quietly straining every time he pokes and threads the hooked needle through her skin. Blood leaks every time he presses the needle through the flesh and the worry of infection nags at him insistently, but his mother made it clear time and time again that they couldn't afford to go to hospitals. When he finally finishes he cleans away the remaining antibiotics and blood from her stitches before redressing them.

His mother wobbles up onto her feet and stares at him, “Fetch me a change of clothes, would you? I'm gonna shower.”

He quickly takes off his bloodied gloves and thoroughly washes his hands as his mother strips off her remaining clothing and cuts the shower on. He hurries out of the bathroom to gather her a change clothes. When he re-enters the bathroom he shuts the door behind him to keep the room insulated and warm. He sets his mother's clothing on the toilet by the shower and gets to work. He cleans any stray blood from the floor, as well as set aside the equipment to disinfect.

As he works he listens for his mother to make sure she hasn't collapsed or isn't moving but the shower quickly shuts off and an arm pokes from between the curtains for a towel. He waits and he hears his mother sigh quietly. He chews his lip absentmindedly and pushes down any reservations, “You've been reaching contacts, right? You should ask for a doctor.. We're going to see them anyways so it couldn't hurt to ask.. right?”

His mother says nothing but he can hear the shuffling of the towel as she dries herself off. He says nothing more and finishes cleaning before he leaves the bathroom.

⁂


	4. three

 

They stay in the hotel for only two nights before they move on to another hotel on the opposite end of the city, knowing that the area was more than likely crawling with his father's men by now. It was nothing short of a miracle that they weren't at their doorsteps already. But now that his mother was weak and recovering he needed to be even more aware of his surroundings for the both of them. His mother wouldn't let him begrudge himself, calling shame and remorse a useless thing but if it made him perform better he'd gladly beat himself up over his mistakes.

Stefan is somewhat surprised when Anna confirms to him that she had been reaching out to one of their contacts and that they were permitting them access to a safe house. It had only been half a week since the attack but her deeper wounds were slow to heal and his mother was clearly fatigued and in constant pain. There was also the fear of infection. Before they met up with the escort, Anna made Stefan promise not to talk, not to say anything beyond the necessary in front of these people.

"Not even to talk to you?"

She gives him an affronted look, "Especially not to talk to me. Play the weak, scared, and useless son and they won't give you a second look. It'll be better for the both of us."

Stefan tries not to feel offended but knows that even without trying he's mostly weak, scared, and useless anyways.

She then tells him that they would only stay for a day or two. That they would leave the city, this country, and that they were going to change their names. It was frightening that they've been found and Anna knows she'll have to pull strings and drop a lot of money to throw Nathan's men off their trail this time. Last week was too close of a call for comfort.

 

When they meet their escorts, a lady accompanied with two bodyguards, at an empty parking lot Anna freezes and places a hand over her holster, “Who are you? I was told we were meeting with a Renard and you don't look like an Renard.”

“Those assholes at HQ..” The lady smiles coldly, “I assure you I am your escort but my name Michelle, it isn't Renard anymore. HQ must love throwing off missions for their own bigoted reasons..” She jerks her chin at one of the bodyguards, “Show her your insignia, she won't trust us otherwise.”

The bodyguard huffs but he obliges as he loosens his tie and pops a few buttons off his shirt to reveal some of his chest which had an intricate tattoo scrawled across it. Anna squints at him but seems to recognize the meaning behind the tattoos as she nods at him.

“So, Michelle was it? A pleasure to meet you.”

“The pleasure is all mine, Mary,” Michelle bows her head. She looks over at Stefan with a broad smile, “Hello Nathaniel, I've heard so much about you. It's a pleasure to meet you as well.”

Stefan smiles stiffly, “And you.”

Michelle seems to pick up his discomfort as she laughs, “Shall we go? I'm sure you'd like to get treatment as soon as possible.”

They're promptly taken to a busier part of the city but where Michelle assures as one of their most secure safe houses that's stocked with everything from ammunitions to clothing and food. After Anna is given professional treatment (the doctor personally complimented Stefan's stitching but he found it a weird thing to praise) they're escorted to a standard looking apartment complex building. They're taken to the topmost floor to the penthouse and, save for the occasional bodyguards, exit the elevator into a foyer which branches to three doors. They take a door on the right into a decently sized bedroom that had tall, open windows running along the farthest side of the room. Stefan couldn't fathom how anyone could live here without the constant fear of being looked in on but he would have to deal with it for now.

When they're finally left alone the meek smile slides from Stefan's face and he watches as his mother's stoic and hard-to-read expression slides marginally with the wrinkles of pain she was in.

She heavily sets her bag down beside the bed before sitting herself down, looking around the perimeter of the room before settling her stare on Stefan. 'Check the room,' he reads from her look. They may have been graced with hospitality and a roof over their head but neither of them fully trusted their hosts, even if they were connected to Mary's origins.

Stefan carries his bag with him as he walks the length of the room, checking the knick knack decorations on a well stocked bookshelf for any concealed cameras or recorders. He finds an audio recorder tucked on the backside of the bookshelf and shakes his discovery jokingly at his mother who only frowns at him. He tosses it to her to look at and continues shuffling around the room for any more.

He runs his hand lightly against the wall and stops at a painting before lifting it off the wall and finding another recording device attached to the back of it. He carefully takes it off before pocketing it and remounting the frame back on the wall. He continues walking around the room gathering only two more devices before placing them on the bed by his mother.

She looks up from a recorder she was in the middle of disassembling and gives the scant pile of Stefan's findings a brief glance before giving a greatly dissatisfied look at Stefan. He can tell her thoughts clearly: 'That can't be all.'

He knows she's probably right. Between him and his mother she had the exceptionally sharper eyes, keener senses of sniffing things out. They were being bugged so conversations would have to be on a complete standstill not that was impossible. Anna was refreshing him on his French and their mundane small talk wouldn't give too much away to their hosts when they checked back on their recordings. But the paranoid part of Stefan suspects if given their host's choice they would only leave to be deposited back into the Hatford's custody, or worse, to Nathan's men.

 

They're checked in on every couple of hours by their temporary host and she is all smiles as she asks them if they have any requests or complaints.

'The recording devices are a curious accessory to the room, are all of your guests given such an honor?' Stefan thinks as he smiles. "I was wondering if we could restock some of our supplies? Our medical kits are somewhat lacking compared to what you have."

Michelle laughs softly and lays a hand on Stefan's shoulder amicably, "Of course, I can have that arranged." She graciously lets go and looks sympathetically at Anna who was sleeping in bed, "I was actually sent to tell you and your mother that dinner was prepared but perhaps I'll have it sent to your room instead?"

Stefan keeps his smile as friendly as he can manage , "That's very generous of you, thank you."

Michelle smiles warmly back at him and she then excuses herself out of the room.

Stefan stands at the door to listen as her high heels click away, along with the near silent shuffle of another pair of feet. His ears buzz as he strains for any more sounds but comes back with nothing. He sits down at one of the chairs in the corner keeping his watch between his mother's sleeping form and on the door as he waits for Michelle to come back with their food and supplies.

She comes back thirty minutes later with the older woman that Stefan recognizes as the doctor that treated his mother and another young man who pushes in a cart of food and leaves as soon as he parks it at the foot of the bed. The doctor motions for Stefan to come to her at the desk as she sets a large shoulder bag down.

"Everything's in here, take it all or pick out what you want. I've also put some clothes in there for the both of you, though mostly for you. You could do with some new clothes, boy."

Stefan keeps his expression passive as he thanks the older woman who then leaves. When Michelle catches his attention she smiles at him. Stefan can't tell if it's forced or genuine but he doesn't find himself trusting or liking her any more than when he first met her.

"So, after you've eaten if you'd like to shower or use the bathroom I can show you where it is? I'm sure you've noticed there isn't one in this room, don't ask me what the floor plan designers were thinking. Everything's separate from the master bedroom."

Stefan nods, "Yeah, that'd be nice."

He walks after Michelle who was already leaving the room. When he flicks a glance back at his mother he nearly freezes when he notices she's awake. She gives him a short nod before closing her eyes again.

 

As they walk across the foyer, past the elevator into the other side of the apartment Stefan wonders if there was anyone else in the building. When they drove into the attached parking garage it was eerily empty but Stefan guessed that a gang-owned safe house wouldn't be teeming with tenants. He can't help asking his friendly escort though, "So are we the only ones you're imparting your hospitality?"

She looks at him with an eyebrow raised but smiles a confirmation, "We thought you would like as much privacy as possible so yes, aside from security personnel and staff, the only ones residing in the building at the moment are you and your mother."

She walks them past a kitchen opening out to a spacious living room, down a short hallway to a wooden black door and opens it. When Stefan peeks his head to look in it leads into a spacious walk-in closet that dead ends to a frosted glass door.

"Through the door is the bathroom, it is fully equipped with everything from face moisturizers to a trusty loofah."

“And in there,” she continues on, arm sweeping to the closet doors lining the wall, "Is everything from bed sheets and towels. There's also clothing that you can pick out for yourself if you find Gerta's fashion sense isn't up to your tastes." She smiles as she turns off the lights and closes the door. "I'll walk you back to your room."

When Michelle finally leaves Stefan perks up at the plate of food that his mother hands him. He eats silently as he watches his mother sort through the bag the doctor left them. She places a pile of folded clothing onto the bed and points from it to Stefan with her eyebrows raised slightly and he tries not to roll his eyes. He picks grudgingly at the various greens his mother piled onto his plate and dutifully eats it to finally get her to stop glaring at him though he can't help but make a childish show of it.

As he munches on a piece of bread he taps on the table to get his mother's attention. When she looks at him he tells her he'll show her to the bathroom later and she only nods, Stefan doubts the shower would be pleasant but she'd want to check out the room regardless.

After Anna finishes restocking their aid kits (Stefan waggled the multiple painkillers at his mother in mocking joy and she only shot him a stern look) Stefan walks her to the bathroom.

At the spacious closet Stefan watches as his mother opens drawers and systematically pulls out towels before shoving them into Stefan's arms. She flicks through a row of clothing before pulling off various hangers of shirts, sweaters, and jackets before tossing them onto the low sofa in the middle of the room. She lastly deposits various pairs of jeans into Stefan's arms before crouching down slowly to dig through a drawer for underwear and undershirts.

"I'm showering first. Try those on and find what fits you."

When Stefan nods at her she takes the towels back from him and hobbles on through the frosted glass door.

Stefan sets the pile of jeans down besides the clothing his mother picked out and goes back to lock the room door before he slips his gun and knife off of him. He doesn't bother checking himself out in the mirror as he tries on the clothing, he twists around in the jackets to feel how much movement he could make and, satisfied with what his mother picked, he waits for her to finish.

 

He showers quickly, though he spent a good minute marveling at the overabundant amount of bathing supplies that was lined up in the shower. He carries both his and his mother's clothing back to their room and deposits it all onto their bed. He removes his old clothing from his bag and drops them onto the floor as he packs his new clothing away, leaving the jacket out to put on later when they leave.

His mother waves a hand at him, “No, take out the outfit I showed you. You can get rid of the things you're wearing.”

He does as he's told and he feels somewhat uncomfortable with the clean but new stiffness of his jeans. He high steps in place to try and get used to the movement in it before his mother tells him to sit still.

“We're leaving tonight.”

Stefan's eyebrows raise in genuine surprise, “I thought we'd wait until at least tomorrow.”

“Change of plans,” Anna finishes putting her things away and secures her bag closed before she sets it on the bed. “I don't trust them, especially since they put us on the highest floor. Harder to escape, easier to monitor us, and restrict our movements to keep us from exploring. They want us to keep put.”

That made sense. It was still risky to try and escape when they had no idea of the floor plan or of how tight the security was, which had to be exceptionally staffed. The odds were against them and if they were found acting hostile with no reason they could be restrained and separated. Worse case scenario they could be killed.

“Do you have a plan?”

His mother looks at him, “Of course I do.”

The return of her attitude was reassuring in a strange sense.

“Okay. What do you want me to do?”

“Nothing. I'll take care of it.”

“Okay.”

He watches his mother sit at the end of the bed and pats the spot beside her for Stefan. “Sleep a while. I'll keep watch.”

He climbs into the large bed with his new boots on, his back curled against his mother who was sitting at the edge and watching door. His mind eases into following the ticking of a clock and soon he's fallen asleep.

 

⁂

 

Stefan wakes up to the muted sound of voices. He keeps still where he's lying, noting that his mother was no longer at his back and his body felt incredibly heavy from sleep, and from how dark it had become outside he had to have slept for more than a few hours. He startles when there's a sudden thud and he's sitting up, looking around but realizing that he was alone in the room. The door bangs open and his mother slams the door behind her, urgency showing on her face.

“Your bag, get your--” There's thudding and shouting at the door, “ _Quickly_ , Stefan.”

He runs to his mother's side and hands her her bag. She absentmindedly pulls it on her back and takes out a knife with a _tsk_.

When Stefan looks at her questioningly she only shakes her head, “I'm running low on ammo.”

He cocks his head to the side and thinks of offering his gun to her but she's already opening the door. There's a surprised yelp that's suddenly cut off and a body falls to the floor, partially lying across the threshold into the bedroom. The leaking blood stained the plush white carpet a vivid bright red and a part of Stefan felt bad for the servant that would have to clean it out.

“Stefan!” His mother yells for him.

He looks up and rushes to her side, she braces an arm over him when another man (the man who showed them his tattoo, Stefan realizes), appears at the door across the foyer and unholsters his gun. Amazingly, his mother throws her knife and it hits the man square in his torso and he drops his gun. He scrabbles at the wall, gripping at the knife as he slumps down.

Stefan stares dumbfounded for a moment before he finds his voice, “You can throw knives.”

His mother briskly walks over to the man and he grunts incoherently as he reaches for his gun but she takes it from him. She then pulls the knife from the man's chest and stabs it into his neck in a smooth motion. She walks back to Stefan checking her newly acquired gun's magazine as she talks, “Of course you can. It's just risky and leaves you empty handed since you can't always get it back after you throw.”

They rush down the stairwell, Stefan a great distance ahead of his mother before he belatedly realizes that his mother couldn't run as quickly as him in her condition. He feels a trace of embarrassment at not being mindful but she was too frustrated at her own fatigue and pain to notice.

They go down flight after flight of stairs without hearing anyone else enter the stairwell and Stefan was beginning to worry. His mother isn't far behind with that thought and tells him to stop for a moment. They're on the fifth floor and his mother stands by the door to listen. She cracks it open to get a peek but there's no one in their immediate line of sight.

“Maybe they're waiting for us outside?” Stefan offers.

“If they are then they're smarter than I thought.” Anna lets the door close and continues down the stairs. The frown worrying her face made Stefan think that his words might have a vein of truth but she doesn't say anything as she leads the both of them down.

 

They go pass the ground floor to get to the underground parking garage. In normal conditions they would have just rushed out on foot but in his mother's current state, stealing a car would increase their chances and the amount of distance that they could cover. Stefan hasn't driven since they left America since they could reasonably depend on public transportation in Europe, though they occasionally hijacked cars.

When they reach the garage Stefan freezes when he spots Michelle standing by a car, her hands clasped at her front as she looks out of the garage onto the street. Anna shoves at his shoulder and jerks her chin at him to move. A part of him gets a chilled hunch of what's going to happen. He looks around briefly for any men that may be hiding in the shadows but finds that there was no one else in the empty parking garage.

Michelle notices them soon enough and she smiles at Stefan.

“Good. You made it,” she says. “I was beginning to worry.”

_What?_

His mother nods, “Only had to deal with two of them like you said. You really saved us.”

 _Oh_ , Stefan thinks, instantly piecing it together that their lady escort was aiding in their get-away.

Michelle shakes her head, “It's the least I can do. I couldn't allow them to do as they pleased. I still remember and hold my pledge to the Hatford's.”

Anna nods curtly and Michelle directs a small smile at Stefan, “This is goodbye.”

“I guess so. What's gonna happen to you?”

Michelle seems amused by his question, “Shouldn't you worry more for yourself? I'll be fine, Nathaniel.”

Stefan thought his face wouldn't give anything away but by the way that Michelle's expression falters apologetically makes him think otherwise.

“Sorry, you don't like that name do you?” She shakes her head suddenly, “No, it's alright. But really, you should leave.”

She begins walking the both of them to the car and hands a set of keys to Anna, “They've probably noticed Adam and Oscar aren't at their stations. They'll soon notice I'm missing and I can't say I plan on going back, so who knows. Perhaps we may meet again.”

Stefan largely doubts that they'll ever see each other again. Anna unlocks the car and tosses the keys to Stefan. She climbs into the passenger side and Stefan hesitates, glancing between Michelle and his mother. His tongue feels heavy from lack of use for words he hardly spoke, “Thank you, Michelle.”

Her expression softens and she nods, “Goodbye, Stefan.”

He nods back at her and gets into the car and takes them off down the dark and empty streets. Soon, old memories of his time in Germany start to play in the back of his head as he drives.

 

⁂

 

Stefan's poking his fingers into the snow, leaving four neat holes in the ground when he pulls his hand away. He pokes another four holes in the snow and then another four, all equidistant from each other and soon enough he's making a polka dotted pattern in the soft powdery snow. He shivers when he remembers how cold he is and breathes hotly onto his reddened fingers.

He frowns with the belated realization that his damp fingerless gloves were doing nothing to shield his fingers from the cold. He gravitated to them in the first place because he felt it was easier to grip the gun and knife without a layer of fabric making his grip feeling bulky but he wasn't sure if numb fingers were that much better of a trade off.

He flexes his hand absentmindedly, still crouched down on the ground and fixing his stare up and down the snow covered park. His mother planted him in this spot with a fierce, “Stay put” as she went on ahead into the building across the street. They finally managed to shake off their tails but not without a price. Stefan could suddenly smell the metallic tinge of blood, the sharp scent of gunpowder, and the burnt flesh from a misfired gun. He pokes another set of holes into the snow and focuses on the pristine glittering of the snow.

．．．．．．

 

Before they even reach a safehouse or a place where Stefan knows he can let down his guard enough for rest, the back of his throats burns with the phantom taste of whiskey and the pain he's going through only seems to magnify in helpless circles. Mostly so because his mind can't fully register the degree of pain he's in and the numbing mask that whiskey put him through only further dislocates himself from his body. He wishes such mechanism was possible without the assistance of alcohol since, no matter how many shots he has taken in his young life, he still wasn't accustomed to the near nauseating taste of alcohol. He doesn't complain about it anymore, the taste was a bearable discomfort compared to fully feeling the pain his wounds would inflict on him.

He obediently takes another drink from his mother and knocks it back in a quick gulp. Typically that'd be that, chasing his shots with a sweeter drink to override the hot bite of alcohol was rare but this time he was lucky. He graciously gulps mouthful after mouthful of almost nauseatingly sweet fruit juice and the bitter taste of alcohol is all but gone. Soon enough it'll hit his system and the pain will be tolerable enough.

His mother pokes near his wound and he tenses but nods an okay at his mother to go on. She sews his wounds in silence, her focus unwavering in the low light of the room. He almost drifts off to sleep, the alcohol warming his body and making his mind feel heavy, but his mother unkindly presses a finger down when she notices he's nodding off.

He sets his jaw firmly to keep from crying out or let a shuddering breath out, any admittance to pain or discomfort only irritated his mother and building up her anger would be detrimental.

He watches distantly as his mother threads his flesh back into place, a numbed buzzing covering his cheeks.

 

⁂

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> unless there's any doubt, yes michelle is a trans woman. i somehow keep getting attached to these side characters i make and spend more time making up backstories i'll never use or reveal instead of trying to drive the plot or make the actual fic more interesting. Whoops.
> 
> anyways, next chapter will be the last and i'll probably post it on saturday or so. thank you so much for reading.


	5. four

 

They drive all night. Or Stefan does, he doesn't think driving would be ideal for his mother in her state so he places all his focus and energy into it. His mother doesn't try to change his mind, after giving him various hushed instructions of where to go she naps in her seat. They drive out of the city to broad valleys until a back road takes them to an isolated patch of land where a mansion is nestled among a thick of trees.

He parks the car in front of the leading steps to the building where a pair of bodyguards, maids, and an elderly man with snow white hair stood.

He opens his arms in welcome though Stefan can tell from the look in his eyes that he held some distaste towards him and his mother. He keeps quiet without being told and his mother doesn't even spare a glance to Stefan. It would be rude to their host.

“Mary, Mary. You've gotten so very far from home. You aren't lost now, are you?”

Anna stays at the bottom of the stairs looking up at the man, “Spare me the ridicule, Asger. I'll gladly go to the Wolf's if this is how you're going to greet me, prior correspondence be damned.”

Asger tuts and shakes a finger at her, “No, not ridicule, just some belated life coaching. Which I'm sure you're in need of, your manners are so lacking. Did that Butcher beat it out of you?”

Stefan stills at the mention of his father while Anna answers mildly, “I'd say you're the one lacking in manners, don't test my patience.”

“Well, pardon me. I'll hold my tongue for now.” He holds out a hand at her, “Come inside, come inside. Heike, be a dear and move the car would you.”

“Yes sir,” one of the bodyguard bows her head.

From afar Stefan didn't notice anything but when the young woman walks up to get the car keys from him he can clearly see the jagged scarring of chemical burns on the dark skin of her face. She stares back at him passively and the hairs on the back of his neck rise, his instincts telling him this person was dangerous. He quickly follows after his mother as soon as he hands over the keys.

 

If the outside wasn't impressive enough inside the mansion was a complete show of wealth and power. Stefan wasn't knowledgeable but he could tell from just a glance that the furniture, paintings and sculptures that decorated the mansion weren't cheap. They're led to a sun room where drinks and food were already set on a table. Asger doesn't waste time with formalities though.

“Before we start you do have the money, right? You know how dangerous this is and I can't have you wasting my time.”

Anna looks briefly looks at Stefan, “I don't see any of the paperwork I asked for so I don't see why I should be paying you.”

“I'd like to call it an advance pay, you know this isn't kids play Mary.”

“Doubting my trust and pushing me around seems like the petty intimidation techniques I'd expect from street gangs.”

Asger visibly tenses, an incredulous look crossing his face, “Pray pardon? I didn't quite hear that.”

“You heard me. If this is how you treat your associates I can't imagine how far the Bayer's family has fallen. So much has changed since Regina's passed. Can't imagine what she'd think of your behavior.”

“Well, that we'll never know. She is dead after all.”

Anna looks over at him, “Pity.”

They stare at each other in silence before Asger concedes, “Yes, such a pity.” He flicks a finger and one of the bodyguards leaves the room. He comes back with a slim black binder that he hands to Asger.

He holds out the binder to Anna and she only eyes it before looking up at him, “I do hope that's everything.”

He laughs, “Yes, of course. We aren't pathetic street gangs after all.”

She takes the binder and doesn't bother to look inside. She hands a sealed file over to the man, “The money plus some.”

He hands the file to a bodyguard who promptly leaves the room with it. As he leaves the room the woman with the scarred face, Heike, enters the room. She bows respectfully to Anna before she speaks quietly to Asger.

“Well, Heike will take you to your rooms. She'll also be with you during your stay, I hope you don't mind but she is a well-behaved, quiet girl. We'll be eating shortly.”

“Of course,” Anna says. They follow Heike out and she leads them to a room on the second floor, spacious and airy with large windows facing a large garden. When they're left alone Anna doesn't spare any words to Stefan, she seemed absorbed in her thoughts and Stefan didn't have the mind to try and prod her into talking.

 

⁂

 

After dinner Stefan's left alone with Heike as his mother had to privately talk with Asger. His mother's earlier warnings of Heike echoed loudly in his head so he wasn't sure what made him think that following Heike into the kitchen was a good idea, especially when she suddenly reached into his jacket and took his knife from him. He reacted too slowly and when she hit him square in the sternum when he got too close his instincts kicked in and he lashed out blindly but completely misses Heike's form. She laughs as she backs away, tossing the knife around. As he warily eyes her something seems to click as she smiles even more broadly.

“What, afraid of knives? Pathetic coming from the Butcher's son.”

Stefan tries not to scowl because her words did have a vein of truth to them. Heike circles around Stefan, her heels clicking on the smooth stone flooring of the kitchen. She stops at the opposite end of the island counter from him and sets down the knife, “So tell me, how's it that someone who's scared of knives handling them anyways?”

Stefan stays silent and Heike scoffs, “You're very good at holding conversations.”

“That's because I never hold them.”

“Clearly,” she smiles. “Don't you want to ask me anything? Like how I got this?” She brushes a hand over the scarring that traces down from her face to her neck.

“I imagine everyone asks you and I don't think starting on the wrong foot with you would benefit me.”

“How so? I'm just a well-behaved, quiet girl.”

Stefan looks at the knife and back at her, “I'd argue the well-behaved, quiet part but you're a girl who can handle a knife and has the habit of eavesdropping.”

She covers a hand over her smiling, “Oopsie, how'd you find me out? Was I eavesdropping too loudly?”

“Mom says I shouldn't talk to you.”

“Yes, I heard. Do you listen to everything Mother tells you to do?” She laughs, “Such a momma's boy, no wonder you're no fun.”

Stefan frowns, “What does being fun have to do with anything?”

Heike raises her eyebrows and leans forward, “Everything. Have you never sneaked off from momma?”

“Why would I do that?”

“I don't believe this.” Heike sighs sadly, “How old are you, 15? Don't tell me you've never held someone's hand.” When Stefan opens his mouth she cuts him off, “And don't you dare say you've held your mom's, you'll break my heart.”

Stefan knew he lost all traction in the conversation and he wanted it to end, “How does hand holding have anything to do with fun?”

“Not much but I am officially heart broken. We're fixing this right now,” Heike backs off the counter and rounds it again to stand in front of Stefan. She holds a hand out to Stefan and he only stares at it before looking up at her. She huffs, “Oh fine, be difficult. Here.” She takes his hand and holds it in her own.

They stand there a moment and Stefan's feeling of discomfort only grows, “Can we talk about something else.”

“Sorry,” Heike laughs and lets go. She pats Stefan on the cheek, “Promise me you'll try to make more conversations, you'll lose your mind only talking with mommy and I can just tell she's fun to be around given how you are.”

“I'm fine,” he bites out as he backs away from her. It was irritating that she acted like she knew Stefan.

She simply smiles, “Don't say I didn't warn you.”

Stefan ignores her teasing, “How did you get your scars?”

Taken aback, Heike's eyebrows rise. She cocks her head to the side, thinking where to start.

“Well for starters, I'm not from Germany. My name isn't really Heike, just like your name isn't really Stefan.”

Stefan watches her, “What does that have to do with your scars?”

“Everything,” Heike exclaims, as if it was obvious. “Where I'm from women are treated like nothing and I was the head daughter of my.. family, so you can imagine how much they loved me.” She stays quiet for a moment, trying to word her thoughts before she continues, “My family wasn't normal, and they had an image to uphold so they couldn't exactly go around killing me, especially when I was the only child. But I guess I crossed a line for them when I just so happened to be caught kissing another girl since they tried killing her before they graciously dumped acid on my face.”

Stefan was familiar with violence against others but couldn't understand the focused hatred towards gay people. A large fraction of the homeless he and his mother had met were gay and they had either ran away, been disowned by their families, or were struggling to get a footing in any employment since most employers slated the odds against them.

“I'm sorry.”

Heike shakes her head, “Don't be, she's not stuck in this business like me and I don't feel sorry for myself or what I ended up doing to them. Well, that's the extremely abridged story but I'm lucky where I ended up. I can't say what it took to lead me to where I am is any interesting, but I'm sure you can understand.”

“Is that why you decided to bother me?”

Heike smirks, “That's exactly why I decided to bother you.” When Stefan looks at her unimpressed she waves a dismissive hand at him, “Maybe your mom is the most riveting company for you but I'm not like that. I get easily bored of flirting for the attention of my colleagues, especially when they're all stuck up prudes who only care about exercise routines and which caliber of guns are the best. So, of course I have to bother the new pretty face.” She sighs, “Y'know, we never get many visitors and when we do most of them are old white men who give me the stink eye.”

“Can't say I blame them.”

“Oh, did I scare you?” She leans a hip against the counter, “Can't say you looked any inviting yourself.”

Stefan shrugs, “Force of habit.”

Heike nods as if to say 'Fair enough.' She reaches back over the counter for Stefan's knife and checks the blade a moment before shaking her head in disapproval, “This baby is so dull, how old is this knife?”

“Few months.”

“Damn. Wait, here,” she reaches into her jacket and pulls out a curved knife from a sheath. It had a finger ring on the end of the hilt and the handle was grooved for an easier grip.

“This is my favorite kid, but I hardly use it. Do you know what it's called?”

“No. Also who calls their knives their kids?”

“Clearly I do, genius. And it's a called karambit, the first weapon I ever learned to use. I'm letting you have this.”

Stefan looks between the knife to Heike, “I've never used that sort of knife.”

Heike grins, “And? I'm sure you have so much free time that you don't know what to do with yourself. Use that time to practice. I can give you quick pointers before you leave tomorrow, the rest you'll have to figure out yourself but you shouldn't have too much trouble. You're probably smart with knives with how scared of them you are.”

Stefan takes the knife, looping his index finger through the ring and tests the grip. He flicks the knife out a few times to get a feel of the weight of the knife on his finger and finds he might like how easily he could implement the knife into his fighting style.

“I think I can see why you like it.”

Heike smirks, “Right? It's double edged and has so many pointed parts that you won't know what to do with yourself. It's versatile as hell.”

Stefan tucks the knife back into the sheath and clips it onto his jeans under his shirt. “Thanks.”

“Don't mention it, I'll be taking this baby.” She sets Stefan's knife back onto the counter.

Stefan looks back at Heike and starts to ask how a heavily used, dull blade was an equal trade for her favorite knife but he freezes when he notices footsteps approaching them. Heike straightens up, smoothly taking the knife off the counter and into her jacket as Anna shows up at the doorway. Stefan could feel the underlying frustration rolling off of her and tried not to inch away when she enters the kitchen. She expertly kept her anger from making a full show in front of others but Stefan could feel himself trying to make his presence smaller from the presence she exuded.

She looks distastefully between Heike and Stefan before speaking to him in French, “Getting to know our bodyguard?”

Denying and lying to her would only piss her off but confirming would piss her off even more since he might as well just say, 'I know I shouldn't but I don't care enough to do what's best for either of us,' however untrue that statement actually was, so Stefan opted to keep silent.

Heike looks curiously between Stefan and Anna, and he stares unbelieving when she answers back to Anna, “Moreso I'm the one partaking his company.”

Anna's mouth twitches but she doesn't acknowledge Heike, “We're going to bed.”

Stefan nods curtly and follows after her, avoiding the searching looks Heike was sending him. She doesn't say anything but she's close behind him as they walk back to their room.

Stefan knows his mother won't hit him or try to re-beat her lessons of survival into him tonight, not when people who had connections to her origins were close by. Even if she had no obvious intentions to go back to her family she still had an image to uphold if she wanted to keep receiving future help. He hoped a few days would be enough to dampen her irritation but given how often he's been caught socializing when he shouldn't be, he knew his mother would snap eventually.

 

Heike doesn't get the chance to give any pointers to Stefan as his mother makes sure that they're never alone together, but Stefan isn't even sure if he'll be able to practice without getting looks of disapproval from his mother so he keeps the knife a secret tucked to his hip. When they leave the next day Stefan catches Heike smiling at him and he finds himself being reminded of Michelle.

 

⁂

 

Before they enter the train station his mother passes a manila folder to Stefan with his new identification papers inside.

“Your old papers,” his mother holds out a hand.

He hesitates, staring at the small thumbnail of himself with blonde hair, at the name 'Stefan Gwerder' before his mother takes it out of his hands. He closes his hand and holds it to his chest as he looks over his new papers, his new name, his new self.

“Tristan Nedelec,” he hushes as his hand fall to his side and he lets the boy Stefan go.

 

 

_..._

⁂

 

When Neil wakes, he wakes slowly. It takes him a while before he realizes that he was staring at the ceiling. His heart was hammering in his chest as if he had just come back from a run and the cold sweat that stuck his shirt onto him only furthered that illusion.

He can hear one of the cats purring loudly and when he turns his head to look he sees Andrew sitting cross legged beside him. King was stretched out across his lap and earning his early morning scratches.

“Bad dream?” Andrew prompts, face cupped in his hand as if he was bored of looking at Neil but he had a feeling Andrew had been watching over him for however long he had been awake.

Neil turns back to the ceiling. It was bare white but the ceiling fan strew strange shadows across it. “What makes you say that?”

“You were making noises.”

“So I woke you,” Neil says, not really in question. “You didn't have to stay in bed if I bothered you that much.”

Andrew grunts but Neil can't find it in himself to apologize. It wasn't the first time their dreams (or nightmares? could it be called that if it was based on reality?) disturbed either of their sleep.

“I dreamt of her. My mom.”

Andrew strokes King's fur and only hums in acknowledgment so Neil continues, “I can't remember what her voice sounds like.”

“Is that something to miss.”

“Maybe,” Neil says. He only mentioned it because back when he expected to die years earlier he could clearly hear his mother's voice. Now it was only a muted garble that hardly held a vice on him like it used to. Things that used to make his skin sting with phantom pain now only lurked as the constant reminder of what was and used to be.

It was almost laughable how many of those reminders would pop up with cocksure presence as if to say, “Hey, Neil! Just a friendly survival tip: you might want to drop everything you're doing and get the fuck outta the building ASAP! You're definitely gonna die otherwise!” and he has to calmly reason with himself like a child that nothing was wrong, that he's _fine_ ; that there was no chance of a burly gunmen planning his assassination being in his vicinity, or that the girl who was constantly looking at him when he was out shopping was most likely not planning to run a knife into his gut and steal his things, or that the man who was walking a little close behind him wasn't following him back to his house to kill him in his sleep, he just happened to be going the same way, or that the slight shift of items in his apartment wasn't the sloppy traces his father's pursuers going through his belongings, it was just Andrew dropping by when Neil was out of the house or ...

Neil knows that trying to talk about his mother was like navigating a minefield blindfolded and for himself solely. He knows Andrew could care less of Neil's mother, of what she was like or what meant to Neil. As far as Neil knew, Andrew despised Neil's mother simply on principle because of what she had done to him, for the sake of survival or otherwise be damned. Neil knew better than to try and defend that, especially when he couldn't say he exactly enjoyed what affect his mother's heavy hand has done to him years after the fact, but he couldn't say he didn't understand. He closes his eyes and tries to find his mind's portrait of her but it was hazy at best.

He wonders if the Hatford family had dusty childhood photo albums of her and Stuart somewhere in their belongings. Even if they did have photos of his mother he wasn't sure if he would ever want to look at them. Memories of his mother were so intricately intertwined with the harsher part of his life that it was inevitable that he'd try and bury every last bit of it, nothing about it was pleasant and he only came to terms with that recently. Maybe that was why he had dreamed of her, her last ditch effort from beyond the grave to try and drill those lessons of survival into him.

He sits himself up. “I can't tell if I like dreams of mom or dad more anymore.”

“Neither of them were pleasant company, as far as I can tell. You can't be around older men without pissing your pants thanks to pops, and you could blame your emotional range of a pebble on mother dearest.”

Neil rolls his eyes and mumbles, “At least one of them wasn't actively trying to kill me.”

“Given how keen on self sabotage you are I'm surprised she never tried to kill you herself,” Andrew says, as if he hasn't threatened to kill Neil for the same reason multiple times himself.

Neil ignores him, he felt more awake now and hugs a discarded pillow to his chest, head pillowed on his arms as he looks back at Andrew. He was chewing on an unlit cigarette and Neil was somewhat grateful he wasn't smoking, intentional or not. He doesn't think he could bear the smell of cigarette smoke at the moment.

They sit in silence and the morning sun slowly crawled it's way into the sky, dragging golden beams across the room with it. Neil blinks himself from his disconnected state of mind when Andrew finally shifts to get out of bed, King chirping in disapproval. He watches as Andrew pads out of their bedroom without a look back.

It almost irritated him, the blind knowing that Neil would follow, but it was a two-way street. He bends over to give King a chaste kiss on his head whose attentive eyes stared back at him.

Neil follows for Andrew out the door.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'll be honest, the last scene was the reason why i started writing this fic and it probably works well enough to stand on it's own but whatever. i am officially emotionally drained and so glad to be done with this lol!! idk if i'll visit this idea again but thanks for indulging me by reading/giving kudos.
> 
> cheers.


End file.
